News from Telos Training and Consultancy in Mental Health & Social Inclusion

Ben Bano with colleagues from the Alzheimers Society in Northern Ireland at the event

Kate Dawson at the MHFA course.

October 2011: Mental Health First Aid - The first Mental Health First Aid programme organised by Telos and facilitated by Kate Dawson took place in London. This programme is ideal for those in pastoral and other situations in understanding the needs of people in mental distress and signposting them where needed to appropriate services.

Some of the feedback received:
'Kate was brilliant, enthusiastic and experienced'
'Very good, informative and energetic'

A further MHFA programme is planned in the Manchester area on 15th and 16th May 2012. If you are interested please click here to enquire further.

Ben Bano with colleagues from the Alzheimers Society in Northern Ireland at the event.

June 2011: Ben Bano was delighted to be able to provide input to the celebration day 'Glancing back - looking forward' organised by the Alzheimers Society in Northern Ireland where he facilitated two workshops for volunteers and staff on the theme of dementia and spirituality. After the event Ben said: 'There is considerable interest in the issue of meeting the spiritual needs of people with dementia and I am pleased that so many volunteers see this aspect of dementia support as essential to their work. I look forward to further collaboration in sharing good practice in this area.'

May 2011: Mental Health First Aid Telos is pleased to offer the nationally accredited Mental Health First Aid Programme this Autumn, which consists of two linked days covering 12 hours input on how to provide immediate support for people suffering from a range of mental health problems. The course will be of particular interest to those involved in pastoral care in parish communities and will be facilitated by Kate Dawson, our Training Consultant for MHFA. Click here for further details of the MHFA programme.

February 2011: Telos launches a new programme on risk enablement in working with people with dementia. Describing the new programme, Ben Bano said: “Person-centered care for people with dementia needs to be underpinned by a positive approach to risk. This new programme is based on the recent DH guidance ‘Nothing Ventured, nothing gained’ as well as on the Nuffield recommendations on working with people with dementia published in 2009. It will be of interest to a range of practitioners, including Approved Mental Health Professionals, Best Interests Assessors, and Independent Mental Health Practitioners.”

December 2010: New Church based Mental Health training programme
Telos is delighted to have been awarded a grant from the Catholic Bishops Conference of England and Wales to provide training on Mental Health issues to parishes and deaneries in the course of the next 18 months. Ben Bano said: This grant shows the commitment of the Church in the important role that Church Communities can play in welcoming and including people with mental health problems. As a result of this programme people will be more aware of ways in which mental health issues can be addressed in a positive and constructive way.

October 2010: Understanding and meeting spiritual needs of people with dementia
Telos has been commissioned by the Dementia Services Development Centre of Canterbury Christchurch University to contribute a section on spirituality to a trainers pack to deliver a dementia awareness programme from 2011. Ben Bano said: 'Understanding and meeting spiritual needs is a vital component of person-centered dementia care. I am pleased that assessment of spiritual needs and spiritual care will feature in what is an innovative training initiative'.

'Its still ME, Lord' - Further wokshops on this theme were delivered in Bridgend and Wakefield, attracting over 100 people to the two sessions. The DVD which Ben produced can still be ordered through www.csan.org.uk

September 2010: Ben Bano delivered the first session in the series of workshops on person-centered crisis intervention for people with dementia and their carers. The feedback from the workshop included:

'Really helpful training and good trainer'
The ABC - Antecedents - Behaviour - Consequences approach was really helpful
I will use the learning from this course in assessments and reviews

August 2010: Enhancing our leadership skills as Approved Mental Health Practitioners
Our effectiveness as AMHPs can be measured as much by leadership as by professional practice skills. This new workshop, facilitated by Ben Bano, considers practice as AMHPs through the perspective of Emotional Intelligence (EI). Using the EI toolkit developed by Daniel Goleman, participants are encouraged to reflect through their practice on the leadership skills they bring to the Mental Health Act assessment process. Click here to enquire further about this workshop which can be offered either as part of the AMHP training programme or as a refresher session.

July 2010: Praise from Archbishop for 'Its still ME Lord'
The DVD 'Its still ME, Lord' on meeting the spritual needs of people with dementia, produced by Ben Bano, continues to attract interest, including service providers as far afield as the USA and Australia. At the recent 'Faith in Health' Conference, Archbishop Vincent Nichols, said: 'One of the reasons this DVD is so striking is that it shows how addressing the spiritual needs of older people can help to restore the dignity of which they can so often feel robbed by pain, helplessness, loneliness and suffering. There are many ways of responding to such experiences, but among them prayer is the most important...there is an especially memorable scene in the film which demonstrates this well. It is of an elderly lady in the advanced stages of dementia, completely unaware and detached from the people and objects arouns her - literally living in a world of her own - who is brought back to life through joining in the words of a hymn familiar to her since childhood.'

30th April 2010: Telos launches a new series of workshops on the Mental Capacity Act and Deprivation of Liberty Safeguards. Commenting on the launch, Ben Bano said: ‘Following the success of our recent workshops in West London delivered by our MCA training consultant, Liz Sheehy, we are pleased to be able to offer a range of training events, including team based training, to provide awareness training as well as more detailed practice based knowledge.’

Ben on far right with participants at the multi-faith symposium

Ben Bano (on right of photo) with participants at the multi-faith symposium.

23rd March 2010: Ben Bano took part in a multi-faith colloquium at the Nickram Centre, Birmingham which explored various faith perspectives on meeting the spiritual needs of people with dementia. After the event Ben said ‘This was a good opportunity to discuss a number of faith perspectives in relation to dementia and it made me realise that we have so much in common, not least the need to respect the dignity and personhood of the person with dementia. I hope that this is the start of many such fruitful encounters.

February 2010: Telos launches its new programme on person-centered crisis intervention with people with dementia and their carers. This day workshop is designed to help Approved Mental Health Professionals as well as other p/rofessionals in their assessment and care planning with people with dementia and their carers. Launching the programme, Ben Bano said: ‘Its so important that people with dementia, even in a time of crisis, are treated with dignity and respect and that their voice is heard. This workshop provides a toolkit for exploring these issues in the context of positive person work.

February 2010: Telos has been commissioned by the Kent and Medway Dementia Education Collaborative to undertake an audit of the training needs of voluntary sector organisations in order to inform the future training strategy for Kent and Medway. If you would like to contribute to this audit, please click here…

February 2010: ‘It's still ME, Lord – Meeting the Spiritual Needs of People with Dementia’. February proved to be a busy month as Ben Bano facilitated a series of workshops in London, Birmingham, Bristol and Manchester following the launch of the recent DVD. Ben said: ‘It has been a privilege to work with so many committed people in looking at how we can meet the spiritual needs of people with dementia. It was helpful to have such a wide spread of people represented in these workshops’. Click here to enquire about the Powerpoint Presentation used at the workshops.

January 2010: Telos launches its action learning set for Social Care Managers in Mental Health services. These learning sets, now running in South West London and in Sussex, provide an opportunity for managers to develop leadership skills in a safe and constructive environment with a particular focus on implementing the personalisation agenda. Each learning set meets for six sessions and participants benefit both themselves and the organisation by undertaking a change and improvement project. Click here to enquire for more details on how the learning set approach can raise motivation and benefit your organisation.

Click here to enquire about these and forthcoming Telos programmes.